Any teachers willing to give an honest answer?

[nikos]

Do the kids of mums who help in school (PTA, reading) get the best parts in school plays?

Not in DDs school and not in school I work at

I confess I allocate speaking parts on the grounds of X can speak clearly and X's mum will help them learn the lines (only nursery and reception children take part in our school nativity)

Do the teachers actually know or care who is on the PTA?

The simple answer is 'no' ElphabaisWicked. Once I was a parent I tended to know, just because of this silly type thread, when I was young and without DCs I hadn't a clue who was on it!

We don't actually have a PTA

If you have one play a year it is a showcase-you go (as I keep saying) for the confident, the clear voices and the reliable.
After my first mistake, in my first year of teaching with DCs saying-'I can't come, it is Brownie night', I got them to write down the dates and get the parents to sign they would be available. If they didn't sign they were chorus. I then explained the parts and they put up hands if they wanted it and then they auditioned. I took the best for the part. A lot of parents might be surprised, but there are a lot of DCs who don't want to be centre stage.

Actually, I've just realised I have no idea which parents are part of our PTA.

Oh really, Tarquin. How remiss of you. Nikos is a very busy person, apparently, but she still has the time and inclination to know exactly who volunteers at the school, who their children are and what their children do.

I always work it out on: who will speak clearly, confidently and enjoy it. I also take into account who had a speaking role in the last assembly/ nativity and eliminate them for this round. I don't have any chn whose parents work within the school but for the first round of assemblies the chn with speaking parts quite often did (though not always) have stay-at-home mums since they'd had a lot of input over the summer hols. That affect tends to even out over the year. My parallel teacher has the head of the PTA's child in the class and if anything it makes us more reluctant to give her any stand-out roles or opportunities, for fear of this very criticism!